Check of anti-gay rights ref. signatures two-thirds complete

State elections officials said Friday evening that they’ve reviewed about two-thirds of the signatures submitted for Referendum 71, the effort to overturn Washington’s new “everything but marriage” same-sex domestic partner law.

“Nearly 86,000 signatures have been accepted and almost 11,400 rejected for one reason or another,” Brian Zylstra of the secretary of state’s office said in a blog post. “The signature error rate has dropped from yesterday’s 11.97 percent to the current rate of 11.68 percent. The overall rejection rate must not go over 12.4 percent if R-71 is to go on the ballot.”

Sponsors need 120,577 valid voter signatures for R-71 to go before voters in November. Election officials expect to complete the signature count by the end of the month.